The King's Deryni (52 page)

“Have a care, Bishop!” Llion warned, hand on the hilt of his sword.

“No, let be,” Brion quickly said, lifting a restraining hand. “Since I have no intention of complying with the archbishop's
request
, we need not give it countenance.”

“I would not presume to contradict my king,” Siebert went on, “but this was not a mere
request
from His Grace; it was an episcopal directive, for the good of the Deryni boy's soul and yours, Sire. And if you accept it not, I am instructed to inform you that His Grace intends to exercise the full weight of his office to ensure that his directive is carried out.”

“I trust that is not a threat, Bishop,” Duke Richard said.

“Certainly not, Your Highness,” Siebert replied. “Neither he nor I would presume to threaten our king. But he does wish me to tell you this.” He returned his attention to the king. “If you refuse to order the boy to comply with his archbishop's directive, which is all for the regulation of his immortal soul, His Grace will be obliged to impose the penalty of excommunication, not only on him but on yourself, since Alaric Morgan serves you as squire, and you are responsible for all aspects of his conduct. And if it should come to pass that you remain still obdurate, interdict is not beyond—”

“I'll go!” Alaric blurted.

In the immediate silence produced by these two words, all eyes turned to Alaric Morgan.

“Forgive me, Sire, but I am well aware what happens when interdict is imposed. The people suffer greatly.”

Siebert mostly controlled a prim and satisfied smile, sweeping his gaze disdainfully up and down Alaric's taut form, but the king lifted a restraining hand before the bishop could speak again.

“Uncle, please escort Bishop Siebert and Father Gorony to wait outside. The rest of you, please accompany them. I would have private converse with Lord Alaric.”

Richard immediately moved to comply, followed by the others, but the king signed for Llion to remain. Not until the door had closed behind them did the king speak, beckoning Alaric closer.

“I cannot let you do this.”

“Sire, I must.”

“Alaric, it is a noble thing you are offering, to witness such an atrocity against one of your own people,” the king said, “but I cannot ask you to do this.”

“You are not asking me, Sire,” Alaric said quietly. “I have decided that this is something I must do.”

“Alaric—”

“No, Sire. Please do not try to dissuade me. Interdict is too big a price to pay, just to spare me witnessing something unpleasant.”

“‘Unpleasant,'” Brion repeated. The king stared at him for a long moment, then inclined his head in acceptance, though the royal lips were pressed tightly together.

“Very well.” He nodded to Llion. “Bring the others back in.”

Bishop Siebert and Gorony duly filed back into the room, followed by the rest. Alaric remained standing beside the king, where Llion also took up his station.

“Tell your archbishop,” the king said without further preamble, “that I will allow what he has requested. But it is only because
my
Duke of Corwyn has agreed to do it. And make no mistake: Alaric Morgan
is
the Duke of Corwyn, even though he has not yet attained his legal majority. Because of that, selected members of my court, suitable to his rank, will be allowed to accompany him. And if any harm comes to
any
of them, I shall regard it as an act of treason against my crown.”

Siebert inclined his head slightly. “I remind Your Majesty that the Abbey of Arx Fidei is a place of religious sanctuary. Any who pass through its gates are guaranteed the protection of the Church.”

“A singular reassurance to Jorian de Courcy, I am sure,” the king muttered.

“Indeed.” Siebert's expression was one of distaste. “But I am obliged to point out that de Courcy is a convicted heretic, a mocker of the law of God, as well as being Deryni.” He glanced contemptuously at Alaric. “I trust that the Deryni Duke of Corwyn will comport himself appropriately, while under our protection.”

“The Duke of Corwyn is a faithful son of the Church,” Brion said. “I shall send one of my chaplains with him, to attest to that.”

“Then, you need not fear for him, my lord,” the bishop said, and inclined his head in leave-taking before turning to withdraw with his companion.

“God hath delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked.”

—JOB 16:11

T
HE
day appointed for the execution came far too soon. Two days before, Alaric made the journey to Valoret with Llion, Father Creoda, and Jamyl Arilan at the head of a small escort of Haldane cavalry. During the ride, a troubled Jamyl confided that his younger brother was a seminarian at Arx Fidei, and had been present when Jorian de Courcy was discovered.

“All the seminarians were shocked,” Jamyl said. “Morale at the school is dismal; they still have not recovered. And all of them will be required to witness the execution. It makes one wonder how God could be present through all of this, and allow this to happen.”

“Unfortunately,” Father Creoda said, “God's laws and man's laws do not always coincide. But He is always present, even in the midst of adversity, and He will surely be with Father Jorian.”

When Alaric said nothing, Creoda added, “He will be with you as well, young Morgan, and with all the young men at Arx Fidei.”

“And what of the bishops?” Alaric muttered. “Does God condone what they are doing?”

Creoda shrugged. “We cannot know God's mind, my son. He gave us free will for a reason, even if we do not always understand it. But surely He will be with the bishops, in hopes that their hearts may soften, in the end.”

“Enough to help Jorian?” Alaric retorted.

Creoda sighed and shook his head. “Probably not. But Jorian will not be alone when he leaves this life. This I know.”

Alaric wished he could be as sure. But perhaps Creoda's prayers could ease Jorian's anguish. At least Jorian could have one priest praying for his soul.

They stayed the night before at a manor house belonging to one of the king's barons, not far from where the execution was to take place. Martinmas dawned clear and crisp, with hardly a hint of the chill of the coming winter. Alaric dressed all in black for the day, with a black cap covering most of his bright hair and a hooded black cloak further obscuring his identity. In a private act of defiance, he wore his mother's St. Camber medal under his tunic, along with his father's Lendour signet on its chain.

Llion and Jamyl likewise had donned stark black, unrelieved by even their knight's belts, though under their cloaks both men wore long dirks thrust through the backs of their belts, as did Alaric. Father Creoda looked surprised and faintly scandalized to learn that the three of them were armed, but he could not fault their caution.

“With luck, no one will realize we're anything other than a few outside clergy come to view the proceedings,” Jamyl told him. “But I don't think the king would be pleased if we were to take Alaric in there without at least a chance of defense, if things should turn uglier than they already are.”

Arrangements had been made for an escort of knights from the archbishop's household to conduct them from their lodgings to Arx Fidei. Alaric was less than pleased to discover that their commander was Sir Errol Seaton, the father of Cornelius: sent ostensibly because he was acquainted with all of them from his time at court. But at least Cornelius, now
Sir
Cornelius, was not among their number. Two of the Haldane cavalry trailed along behind, wearing black cloaks and plain harness without the badges of the king.

Several monks were waiting to accompany the four into the abbey precincts, though Sir Errol also remained with them, watchful and efficient, a hand resting on the hilt of his sword. As they made their way through the gates, Alaric fancied he could sense the man's hostility, and was glad that Llion and Jamyl flanked him. Even Father Creoda was a comfort, at his back.

Beyond the gates, their progress was slowed by a sea of dark-clad men, both young and old, ranged in ranks along the edges of the square and wearing the habits of several different religious orders. Most seemed to be seminarians. A smattering of lay folk had also been admitted to the abbey precincts, muttering and milling restlessly to either side of the gates. Mercifully, Sir Errol led them to a place against the north side of the square, where the four of them could stand with their backs against the wall.

But the center of the square provided the terrible focus for what was about to happen. There a stout stake protruded from a dense surround of kindling, extending outward twice the span of a man's arms. A clear path led through the kindling, between the stake and the broad steps leading into the abbey church. There, several men in the purple of bishops had already begun to congregate, some of them speaking quietly among themselves.

“Look at them,
lurking
,” Llion muttered to Jamyl, surveying the gathering crowd. “And these others”—he jutted his chin at the other clerics lining the square. “Did they really bring in further witnesses from other seminaries?”

Jamyl nodded gravely. “That is my understanding.”

“And all these ‘men of God' have come to watch a Deryni
die
?” Alaric whispered, aghast.

“I fear they have,” Jamyl said. “You heard what Bishop Siebert said, when he came to court. They intend to make an example of Jorian de Courcy, to remind other Deryni what will happen to those who defy the laws of the Church.”

Alaric mostly suppressed a shudder, profoundly glad that he had no priestly vocation. He tried not to think about his cousin Duncan, who very likely did.

They watched with increasing apprehension as black-clad men and boys continued to take their places along the edges of the square, until finally a pair of liveried episcopal guards emerged from a door to the left of the church steps, followed by two black-clad and hooded executioners escorting a stumbling scarecrow of a man in chains. The prisoner was heavily bearded, in stark contrast to the clean-shaven clergy in the square, and wore only a scant and tattered loincloth. His hair had been hacked off close to his head so that no semblance of his former tonsure remained.

“Is that him?” Alaric whispered.

Jamyl nodded minutely. “I believe it is.”

“Good God, what have they done to him?”

Jamyl only shook his head, unable to answer, and Llion folded his arms resignedly across his chest as Father Creoda crossed himself in shock.

“God help him,” the priest whispered.

The prisoner staggered as the executioners led him out in front of the church steps to bow to the bishops before turning their prisoner to hustle him along the pathway left clear of kindling. At the same time, several more bishops emerged onto the steps through the great doors of the church, joining the others. One of them was accompanied by two men in the black attire of simple priests, and wore a stark black cope and a towering black mitre. The great crozier in his hand marked him as Archbishop de Nore.

“I think that's Gorony with de Nore,” Jamyl whispered low as he half turned toward Creoda. “Father, do you know who the other man is?”

Creoda shook his head uncertainly. “Perhaps the abbot of this place. I do not know either of them.”

Meanwhile, with nary a wasted motion, the two executioners had chained the condemned man to the stake with his back to the church, leaving only his arms free. Alaric could hardly believe what he was seeing, that they truly meant to do this terrible thing. Jorian, for his part, looked dazed, perhaps even drugged, hardly aware of what was going on around him.

“My brothers in faith,” de Nore suddenly said, speaking from the front edge of the steps, “I have summoned you today to witness the purgation of a grave sinner, who has profaned the very sacraments we all hold sacred. The scourge of Deryni heresy is real, and it is a mortal danger. This heretic thought to bring it into the very bosom of the Church.”

De Nore continued to drone on, sowing the familiar hatred, but Alaric had no stomach for it. Instead he returned his focus to the center of the square, where Jorian's executioners were backing off from the stake, using heavy rakes to close the path in the kindling.

Jorian himself, alone now in the center of the pyre, looked forlorn and pitiable, head bowed and arms hanging limply at his sides, like a man who had lost all hope. Did he pray for deliverance to the God Who had abandoned him to this fate? Alaric wondered.

But he knew there would be no mercy for Jorian in this life. He wondered whether there would ever be mercy for Deryni. He wished there were something he could do, that there were some way he could use his powers to free Jorian, but there was nothing—and he suspected that this was the reason de Nore had insisted he be here. He could feel the hatred beating all around him almost like a living and malevolent entity as the archbishop at last finished his rant and then strode purposefully down the stairs.

Utter silence settled over the square as de Nore halted at the edge of the kindling, briefly surveying the condemned man. The executioners had brought lighted torches to the edge of the pyre as the archbishop spoke, and handed one to the archbishop as he turned to one of them. Without further ceremony, de Nore thrust his torch into the kindling at his feet and stepped back, the two executioners moving in both directions to light the kindling in several other places.

A collective murmur whispered through the watching throng, punctuated by the crackle of dry wood catching fire and then the
whoosh
of flames quickly spreading all along the outer edges of the pyre and eating inward. Alaric flinched at the sound, anxiously scanning the assembled spectators: the grim-faced clergy, mostly impassive, some of them horrified, a few showing sanctimonious satisfaction. The seminarians from Arx Fidei almost universally looked sick at heart and aghast, for the doomed man was their classmate, whom they had thought they knew.

Less varied were the reactions of the lay folk present, almost all of whom seemed to display no indecision regarding what was being done. Catcalls and hoots of derision rippled among them as the flames intensified and as Jorian briefly lifted his hands in a futile warding-off gesture, though to no avail.

Alaric could hardly bear to look, but he knew that he owed it to Jorian, to be witness to this horror. Tears welled in his eyes as he prayed for Jorian's deliverance, vision wavering as the Deryni's bare arms fluttered in a final appeal to heaven, then sank to cross on the heaving chest, the head tipping back against the stake, though he uttered not a sound.

Just then, as Alaric yearned toward the doomed man, wishing he could do
something
,
anything
, to ease Jorian's suffering, he sensed the presence of another, also reaching out to Jorian—and reeled as power rebounded from the contact. In that same instant, Jorian briefly went rigid, then slowly slumped into the flames now surging all around him. And then, as death claimed its victim, from somewhere across the square a young voice cried out:

“Sacerdos in aeternam!”

Sacerdos in aeternam
 . . . a priest forever!

Already recoiling from the sudden perception of magical intervention, which most certainly had given Jorian merciful release in death, Alaric cast his startled gaze in the direction of the shouted phrase, wondering who could have dared to say it:
Sacerdos in aeternum
.

The three words embraced everything that Jorian de Courcy had lived and died for, that were proclaimed before God during every priest's ordination, from time immemorial. Though Jorian's persecutors had declared him heretic and excommunicate, and denied him the sacraments of his faith, and even stripped away his priestly faculties, won so dearly, they could not erase that indelible stamp set upon his soul at ordination, that this was God's priest forever. It might be small solace to Jorian, who now was past having to worry about sanctimonious men who felt compelled to kill what they did not understand, but God surely would receive the soul of this faithful priest.

And who had released Jorian? Alaric thought it must surely have been Sé, for he knew no other adult Deryni who might have gained access to the execution and been powerful enough to do what had been done. But was it? And could it have been Sé who had shouted from across the square, or had caused someone else to do so?

Whatever its source, the shout had silenced the hecklers, ignorant men who rejoiced in the death of a Deryni, but Alaric noticed that soldiers in the archbishop's livery were moving briskly among the men and boys gathered at that side of the square, obviously looking for the person who had cried out. Sir Errol was even eyeing Alaric suspiciously, though he seemed satisfied that Alaric knew nothing of what had happened.

Meanwhile, the fire had totally engulfed the stake in the center of the square, its roar punctuated by the snap and crackle of burning timber that underscored the horror of the deed. No other sound could be heard as the thick column of greasy black smoke rushed upward from the pyre, carrying with it the sweet stench of burning flesh.

Alaric managed not to disgrace himself by vomiting or fainting, but it took a great deal of effort, and he could see and hear others with less fortitude—which made his own struggle even harder. Even though he
knew
that Jorian's soul no longer inhabited the blackened husk writhing in the flames, that the movement came only of the physical reaction of mortal flesh with fire, his stomach told him otherwise. Even Father Creoda looked queasy, and mostly kept his eyes averted, fighting nausea.